Director: Robert Longo
Year Released: 1995
Rating: 1.0
Data courier Johnny (Keanu Reeves) - who has a hard drive installed in his brain - accepts a job to take vital data about a pharmaceutical company's cure for a deadly disease ("the black shakes") from Beijing to Newark, only the information in his head is too large for his memory bank to handle (causing him seizures) and the Yakuza (led by Takeshi Kitano!) want the information for themselves. It's impossible to defend in terms of quality - with the dialogue, special effects and acting all being abysmal (this ranks as one of Reeves' worst performances by far) - yet some of William Gibson's ideas are still notable twenty years later: he's not only covering a fear of corporate power but also a concern over what technology will do to mankind (it's no coincidence the rebellion group is called "Lo-Tek"). While director Longo is an established figure in the fine art world - his "Men in the Cities" series, which features business people appearing contorted and in apparent agony - this is the only feature film he ever made, and appropriately so: know thy medium!
